Driver 3

Perhaps the best way to look at Driver 3 is by calling it what it is: a videogame take on a Hollywood car chase. Driver has always been about great car chases, superb physics and car crashes, and the third in the series is no different. Starring the series' quiet but rough unsung hero, Tanner, the undercover cop once again takes a clever carjacking network. Building on ideas implemented in Driver 2, players once again get the chance to steal an enormous load of cars (in fact, all cars in the game are jackable), are able to drive more cars than before (including trucks and boats), and are once again able to step outside of their cars.

You have to feel sorry for Reflections. The developer always comes close to greatness with its video-game creations, and then ruins them in the last six months of development. Which is a shame for those wanting a playable version of Stuntman that wasn't tediously difficult, or a successful and different take on the "freeform" style of GTA play -- which DRIV3R isn't. Instead, we're "treated" to an overly ambitious effort to re-create three gigantic metropolises, in which vehicles can realistically careen into each other in spectacular collisions, and a single-player plot following the tribulations of the grindingly monotone-voiced and slightly overweight Tanner; the least interesting video-game hero since Trevor McFur invaded the Crescent Galaxy. Read More »